Metal Gear Solid V - KO & Stun Durations

[ᗷᑌᒪᗩᗰᗩTᗩRI]

Here's what I use as my references (quote credit is due to "StucklnMyPants"

Particularly beginners often asked for how long enemies would be knocked off by CQC techniques or be put to sleep by tranq guns, rubber bullets and stuff. Here are some data, though you may wanna verify them by yourself to be absolutely sure, but at least it gives you a general idea, which technique is better than another. To come straight to the point: don't bank too much on your tranquiliser guns! When it comes to duration, chokes and combo punches outdo zzzZZZzzz guns more than twice as much...

QUOTE:

Weapons

• Tranq - 5:00
  
• Rubber Bullets Body shots - 2:30
  
• Rubber Bullets Head shot - 4:12
  
• Stun Arm Lvl 1 charge - :50
  
• Stun Arm Lvl 2 charge - 2:30
  
• Stun Grenade Lvl1, Land behind the enemy - :50
  
• Stun Grenade Lvl1, Lands in front of enemy - :17 (they just cover their eyes)
  
• Sleep Gas Bombardment Rank D - 5:00

Close Quarters Combat

• CQC throw to ground/into wall/off of ledge/pulled from guardtower - :50
  
• CQC throw multiple enemy chain - :50 seconds for the first two, 12:00 for the next two*
  
• CQC throw enemy into a wall that hits another enemy: - enemy thrown :50, enemy hit by thrown enemy 4:12
  
• choke long and short animation - 12:00
  
• punch combo - 12:00
  
• kick enemy while on ground - 12:00
  
• Sprinting Bionic Punch - 4:12**
  
• "Get down!" command - indefinite until Combat alert or until another enemy tells him to get up

*Only tested 4 CQC chain thrown enemies
**One time, it lasted around 7:50. Could have been a headshot that cause this.

I did notice some discrepancies when I first tested it. The times that I tested were longer, like

• CQC Throw - 1:15
  
• Tranq - 7:30
  
• Choke - 18:00

I'm not entirely sure what caused this, as all other tests since then have been like the numbers at the top. It could have been because I was super early in the game and there are longer times to help ease players into the game, or it might have been the fact that the enemy I was testing it on was a target to be extracted in a side-op. Either way, I have not been able to reproduce those times.

I tested all of these multiple times on multiple enemies with a stopwatch. Also, I realize that this isn't even close to everything, but I'm still fairly early in the game. Also found out that the Sonar from the arm is:

• is heard from up to 15 meters away
  
• Lvl1 will ping anything up to 59 meters away
  
• Lvl2 will ping anything up to 89 meters away

UNQUOTE

Hope, that helps. In general: punch combos (the more, the better) seem to be the most efficient way when it comes to speed and ambushing or when you're against several enemies at once. Nip and tuck to combos is choking, which indeed takes more time but lasts 50% longer in return => 18 minutes.

The "Get down!" kicks in when you overrun enemies and just knock them out for a fewer seconds, like with the bionic ppunch or a throw to the ground... any knocked out enemy can be woken up by a kick right after while you wanna make sure to point a gun right in his face, for he will automatically surrender in prone position and stay there "forever", until sb. tells him to get up or you set off an alarm. By that you can take out entire posts, camps, compounds, you name it, without having to kill or fulton anybody. The shady side: keep in mind, that any alert will make them rise all at once. ;)

While trying to verify those data of "StucklnMyPant" by myself I figured out, that a complete combo of punches knocks them off just as long as a choke: => 18 minutes! The tranquilliser however puts them to sleep for about 7 to 8 minutes, while a punch that throws them into a wall lasts for about 6 minutes. A sick joke compared to combo punches or choking them.

Rubber bullets (of an UN-ARC-NL LvL 2) shot at the body knocks them off for 4 minutes, a rubber bullet headshot is good enough for about 6 minutes, just almost as good as a tranquilliser. Higher weapon levels may result in harder bullet impacts and thus in longer lasting knockouts.

[Sexy]

ok

[Claymore Roomba]

Thanks for the guide my man

[Whomping Walrus]

Great information. I love you.

[ᗷᑌᒪᗩᗰᗩTᗩRI]

@Whomping Walrus Aww... thx, glad it still helps folks. I've already forgotten about this post 😄

[Tetsuya_Kurogane]

Always nice to have some hard data. I play this game non-lethally with tranq sniper, smoke grenade to a sprinting punch or just catch everyone in hold-up.

[LSD]

I swear this isn't right. Kicking NPCs unconscious lasts seconds, not 12 minutes. CQC throws into walls last longer than standard throws, but i swear it's not just 50 seconds. Bionic punches last maybe a minute, not 4 minutes.

[kavu91]

Originally posted by LSD:

I swear this isn't right.

This guide seems somewhat incomplete and outdated.

A better measurement of time is to use iDroid timer, using the in game clock/time, because Phantom Cigar is an in game time-passer/accelerator which will not yield the same Stun/Zzz time for Real Time.
Method Example: Choose a way to Tranq/Knockout a Lone Guard, quickly open iDroid to see the in game clock, remember the time, wait for the guard to wake up, then calculate the difference and you'll know the duration of Stun/Zzz.
A few quick tests on Regular Guards in Africa after I saw this post:
Choke, Standing CQC Combo, Kick a Guard while he's laying down, 4 Star Stun Arm 3/3 Charge (Fully Charged AoE Lightning Strike) all yield 2 Hours.
4 Star Tranq Pistol Headshot yields 50 Minutes.
4 Star Stun Arm 2/3 Charge yields 24 Minutes.
4 Star Stun Arm 1/3 Charge, CQC Flip Guard, Throw Guard at a Guard, yields 8 Minutes.

With that much known the denominators should be 2H, 50M, 24M, 8M. Now we can time 1 in game Hour with Real Time to figure out the Stun/Zzz duration. With a stopwatch, 1 In Game Hour = 3 Minutes (Real Time).
Simple math conversion:
2H = 6:00 | 50M = 2:30 | 24M = 1:12 | 8M = 0:24 | (1M = 0:03)

(I'm not going to test every Tranq or Non-Lethal CQC/Weapon/Attack, against every different type of guard rank E-S, nor mission, etc., I will let someone else or others gather data in posts hereafter) Have fun gathering data. :-)

[ᗷᑌᒪᗩᗰᗩTᗩRI]

Originally posted by LSD:

I swear this isn't right. Kicking NPCs unconscious lasts seconds, not 12 minutes. CQC throws into walls last longer than standard throws, but i swear it's not just 50 seconds. Bionic punches last maybe a minute, not 4 minutes.

Bollocks. Whatever you swear, we, who have played this game to great length and extent way before you (I, personally, for ca. 870 h), we swear the same thing: it's all tested and true, or do you think we were too stupid and didn't know how to use a fekking stop watch?! You're offending other people's intelligence, so don't expect much respect in return!

You can't even read properly and probably don't know what a kick at a guard on the ground even means. And stun arm LVL1 (in words level 1) did last only 50 secs, besides, there are more stun arm data e.g. also for lvl 2 (in words level 2), which lasted 2:30 min, StucklnMyPants said (not I, it's a quote, and I did my own test for what I've been interested in, and I was certainly never interested in 150 sec knock out durations during my runs), so just shut it, if you're twisting everything, because then you're not the right person to lecture others, to begin with. A kick lasts only seconds... ? What game is that supposed to be?! Then you might not want to kick like a baby. How about that?

You have only feel and no data, otherwise provide them accordingly. You already don't know how to read carefully, so you certainly also have no idea how to verify the data yourself, because, if a person can read or not, speaks already volumes about how good she is in paying attention to details. Keep that in mind. You need a certain attention span, which is higher than that for 7 min YT videos. People with ADHD are not well suited for profound thoughts or careful, precise work.

Or why wouldn't you create your own hard data sheets and share it?! And maybe you first take a look at the date of our data?! Have you got something like a calendar or at least ever heard of it?

I don't give a fu.ck how you "tested" things until I haven't seen a video of you testing it and how, because either you're too stupid and don't know the difference between the different techniques and attacks and how to perform them properly (and not others are too stupid who did it years ago before you), or, guess what, game got updated and changed for nowadays crybabies who always cry OP everytime they can't win and need to get everything nerfed and (re)"balanced"? Yeah, that figures, doesn't it?

Game standards today are not even game standards anymore. We did speed runs and achievements where those data derived from, based on those data, there are also videos about it out there, so it was very true back then - almost 7 years ago! - and who gives a flying rats fart if it's still true 6 or 7 years lata? We've moved on.

Buy yourself a watch and a calendar before you next "swear" something. What does that even mean, "I swear"? An oath? Which one? Is that a new kind of scientific evidence then, or what? Do the oath police come when you've made a mistake or committed perjury, or what? Or did you mean cussing? How old are you? 14, I suppose. These kids used to "swear" things. If so, they are most likely incapable of doing objective tests with repeatable results, because they would rather play video games today than do well in science subjects at school, where they could have learned how to run objective, unbiased tests correctly to get repeatable results. Because that's what those results are: reproducible, repeatable results, on every godd.amn run.

I almost feel like reinstalling the game and run the tests again, Geezus Christ, recording a video to show what it is today.

And what others talk about "ingame hours" and freakin' cigars, what has that to do with anything?! That's just utter, complete nonsense too. Who cares about ingame time when you do a run and have a real world stop watch measuring the real time? That's what matters, only, and that's what people in their right mind do, even today. I don't get it.

This data had been tested and proven correct every time I and others invaded other players' FOBs, because that's all the late game and endgame is about, and then you'd better run a real timer and not this cigar/in-game-hour horse sh.it. My data (not the quoted data) were correct for 867.4 hours of play, hence they are not debatable, not a subject for discussion.

Investing in a tranq gun early on was a waste, that's what those data are saying. And that's what we did: we invested in sth. faster, just as good, but more ammo, higher fire rate, you name it. That's what you need for invasions of other player's FOBs. In the late game you'll have it all anyway, but in the beginning you want to level up other things, so that really helped you get through even the most difficult missions silently and quickly.

Who uses cigars at FOBs... be my guest. lulz For me, it's a kind of cheating anyway. I have never needed this. There is also no difference between the guards, regular or not, but between the distances at which you use the weapons, regular distances or from too far away.

As pointed out in the guide, the investment in tranq guns and other fancy tech stuff is nearly useless compared to proper CQC, since a complete combo of punches knocks guards off for 18 min (figure first out what "a complete combo" means - are you even capable of executing one? - before your oh so wiser judgment shows up in form of another useless comment). And for the rest you would invest in the UN gun, not tranq guns.

Use the data or leave it and create your own "guide". We couldn't care less, we were done playing this game almost a decade ago.... Pffffft! You necro-bump dudes are way late to our party of yesteryear, and you probably didn't even realise how late you really are. You might even be talking about another game, who knows. lulz

[ᗷᑌᒪᗩᗰᗩTᗩRI]

Originally posted by Tetsuya_Kurogane:

Always nice to have some hard data. I play this game non-lethally with tranq sniper, smoke grenade to a sprinting punch or just catch everyone in hold-up.

That's the spirit! That's what you have to become good at when you invade other players' FOBs later on. Or maybe you already do. Or maybe this feature is gone, as it needed servers to be up. However, you needed to be fast there. Very. And silent. At times also... very. But also leathal when it mattered. And fast again. Good to read that folks are still having fun with the game.

[FATMAN]

This guide is ♥♥♥♥ lol there is a big difference of about 30secs between a regular CQC throw vs one into the wall/breaking tables and ♥♥♥♥. A sprinting bionic punch only lasts about 1:30-2min and a choke out only lasts about 6-7min. NOTHING lasts 12min lol that would be like easy mode and is why I decided to time it myself cuz you very clearly did not. Every hour in this game is 3min in real life time, 12 min from 1800 would be 2200. it's about 1930-2100 before you even have to KO someone and they all wake up long before 000 no matter what you do to KO them.

You are so off that I don't even have to give exact times, a lvl 1 stun arm lasts about 15-20secs (you literally barely have time to hide), a lvl 2 lasts about a minute. How tf are you so off on so many of these? Lol did you even play the game? Are we talking about single player or FOB? The only thing you're right about is hold ups, and you probably only were able to figure that one out cuz it lasts forever. You should kill people and see how long each lethal weapon kill lasts, you might find those times easier to figure out. Use the phantom cigar tho, they take a while in dead mode.

[Nanami]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.